The colony has been in operation fat a little more than eleven years.  The colonists were drawn chiefly from the more densely populated districts of the Punjab province, and were attracted by a series of remarkable harvests, which were sold at exorbitant prices during the famine years.  The land was given away by the government to actual settlers upon a plan similar to that of our homestead act, the settlers being given a guarantee of a certain amount of water per acre to a fixed price.  The demand caused by the popularity of the colony has already exhausted the entire area watered by the canals, but an extension and enlargement of the system will bring more land gradually under cultivation, the estimates of the engineers contemplating an addition of 2,000,000 acres within the next few years.

The value of the crop produced in 1902 upon 1,830,525 acres of irrigated land in this colony was $16,845,000, irrigated by canals that cost $8,628,380, and the government enjoyed a net profit of 14.01 per cent that year upon its benevolent enterprise.  Aside from the money value of the scheme, there is another very important consideration.  More than half of the canals and ditches were constructed by “famine labor”—­that is, by men and women (for women do manual labor in india the same as men) who were unable to obtain other employment and would have died of starvation but for the intervention of the government.  Instead of being supplied with food at relief stations, these starving people were shipped to the Rechan Doab besert and put to work at minimum wages.

You will agree with me that the government has a right to feel proud of its new colony, and its success has stimulated interest in similar enterprises in other parts of the empire.  It has not only furnished employment to thousands of starving people, but by bringing under cultivation a large tract of barren land with a positive certainty of regular harvests it has practically insured that section of the country against future famines.

The following figures will show the rapid development of the colony from the first season of 1892-93 to the end of the season 1901, which is the latest date for which statistics can be obtained: 

Capital outlay to end of year

1892-93 L721,233 1897-98 L1,512,916 1893-94 878,034 1898-99 1,616,676 1894-95 995,932 1899-1900 1,677,982 1895-96 1,174,781 1900-01 1,725,676 1896-97 1,362,075

Acres irrigated during the year

1892-93 157,197 1897-98 810,000 1893-94 270,405 1898-99 957,705 1894-95 269,357 1899-1900 1,353,223 1895-96 369,935 1900-01 1,830,525 1896-97 520,279

Net revenue during the year

1892-93 L4,084 1897-98 L111,041 1893-94 3,552 1898-99 131,566 1894-95 9,511 1899-1900 155,302 1895-96 51,632 1900-01 421,812 1896-97 92,629

Return on capital outlay, per cent